CHICAGOAN TO BE EXTRADITED TO MICHIGAN IN MURDER CASE

Rick Hepp, Tribune Staff WriterCHICAGO TRIBUNE

A Chicago man will be extradited to Michigan to face charges that he killed his uncle for $100,000, according to Michigan authorities.

Harry Von Lee Titlow, 34, of the 1500 block of West Fullerton Avenue, waived his right to fight extradition at a hearing today in Cook County Criminal Court. Titlow, who authorities said also goes by the first name Nicole, will be taken to the Oakland County Jail in Pontiac, Mich.

An Oakland County judge issued an arrest warrant for Titlow on Thursday, and police from Chicago and Troy, Mich., arrested him at his home on Friday, authorities said.

He faces charges that last August he poured a lethal amount of alcohol down the throat of his uncle, Donald Rogers, who already was intoxicated and was lying on his back on the floor, and then smothered him with a pillow, said John Pietrofesa, an assistant prosecutor in Oakland County.

Titlow allegedly was part of a murder-for-hire agreement with his aunt -- Rogers' wife -- in which Titlow would receive $100,000, according to Pietrofesa. The prosecutor alleged that the aunt hired Titlow to kill her husband because she feared Rogers, a businessman with an estimated worth in the millions, would cut her out of his will after she ran up a $50,000 gambling debt last year.

Following Rogers' death, his widow withdrew about $100,000 from his bank account and gave the money to Titlow, said Troy Police Lt. Steve Zavislak.

The aunt has not been charged in connection with the case, according to police. Authorities said the case is still under investigation, and they declined to say whether other suspects would be charged.

Titlow has told investigators that he and his aunt, who had been gambling at a casino in nearby Detroit, returned to the Rogers' home in Troy, in the early morning hours of Aug. 12 and found Donald Rogers dead, according to Zavislak. Titlow was staying with the couple at the time of Rogers' death, although he retained a residence in Chicago, Pietrofesa said.

A police investigation concluded that Rogers, 74, died of natural causes brought on by drinking, Zavislak said. The Oakland County Medical Examiner ruled he died from asphyxiation -- a fatal side effect of alcohol poisoning.

Rogers had a blood-alcohol count of .44 when he died, more than four times Michigan's legal limit of .10, Pietrofesa said.

Troy police reopened the investigation of Rogers' death after a man claiming to know Titlow came forward with information in the case, police said. The man said Titlow confided to him that he had killed Rogers in exchange for money that he was going to use for a sex-change operation, according to Pietrofesa.

Oakland County prosecutors asked that anyone with information regarding the case call them at (248) 858-0656.